Monday, May 25, 2015

Isla is 4 and 1/2 years old. She is full of personality and has a sweet, caring heart. Isla had a wonderful summer with a few weeks of Yoga Camp, Cooking Camp, and a week at Grandma and Grandpa's house. And, of course, a lot of swimming. She likes to do lots of dolphin dives, and even wears her Little Mermaid costume over her swimsuit to feel more authentically mermaid.

She has become a little helper in the kitchen and likes to put on her apron from cooking camp and help stir pots and set the table before dinner. For weeks, she had a special doll and that she would put to sleep every night- change it into jammies, rock it, read it books, give a bottle and them put in the doll cradle. In the morning, she'd change the doll into clothes and then leave it with a frog toy, who was the doll's teacher while Isla was away at school. She kept up with this daily care consistently for weeks! She would ask me at bedtime what I was going to do for brother, and then insistent she needed to do the same for her doll. Sometimes she even passed on her stories because she needed to care for her baby.

Isla is now in the 4 year-old Green Door room at her preschool. She is well-liked and has a lot of friends. She have an active play-date schedule and weekends full of birthday parties. Isla has begun to plan her next birthday party. She was very proud to have conquered the monkey bars on the playground. She likes to work on making letters. She writes the "S" in Isla is backwards, but she said it's only because she likes it that way.

He is such a wonderful little boy. He loves trains, trucks, dinosaurs, helicoptors. He like to talk about them, point them out, read books about them. He has developed this funny little habit of always carrying a few little treasures around in his fists. He almost always has some little bouncy balls, little cars or trucks, some small toys or even a special rock. He talks like a little cave man, mostly 2-3 word sentences or demands. Like, "I-wa, dump couch" means: "Isla, would you jump on the couch with me?" We live a couple of blocks from an Amy's Ice Cream, and there's a a mini bouncy ball dispenser there. August goes crazy over those balls, and usually forgets about the ice cream once we're there.

We put small dump trucks, inside of medium dump trucks, inside of large dump trucks. Little boy phrases spew from his mouth- and I kid you not- "Dinosaurs! Rahr!" "Beep, Beep. Crash!" "Chugga choo choo," "Monster Trucks!" - all day long. Sometimes he has a little car, train, truck along with his for the ride of his day, and then it goes missing. We all look for it- crisis. One day after we picked up Isla from school a few weeks ago- we saw 2 helicopters from the car- and commented on them. Everyday since then he says at the same intersection "Two Helicopters! " and gets upset that they aren't there. He gets mad at me for not being able to reproduce airplanes and helicopters in the sky at my discretion.

Gus sometimes gets irate- and then there's not rectifying the situation. I took off his very most favorite shirt he thought he was going to be able to wear forever, the Duplo cars/ trains won't stay hooked together, He wants to close the gate, but that is physically impossible to do without his body being knocked off the step. August's 2 year-old flip has switched.

Gus was a bumble bee for Halloween. This was a fun Halloween for us, as we have 2 kids who sort of "get it." We read lots of Halloween Books. August has a sensitive soul, and caught on, and he started to declare certain things to be "Skooky." The dark outside is "skooky" and as we walked home at 7:00 pm on Halloween night, everything was "skooky" and we knew it was time to be home safe in our jammies.

August loves his sister and would follow her to the moon and back if she asked him to.

Monday, June 30, 2014

Now it is June, and when I look back on his 15 months blog, all of those things are still going on. Still loves music and dances, but more. Still loves his shoes. But, I think he wants them on just so he's ready to go out the door when sister does. Still loves books and being read to, but more. His favorite books are "Go, Dog, Go" Dr Suess's "ABC's", and "Hop on Pop"; the Corduroy series.

Building castles

And I don't know if I missed it in the 15 month blog- but August loves balls. He loves to play with them, hold them, confiscate them if he sees someone else has them. He loves to carry little choking- hazard size bouncy balls, or even just a marble. They are often hidden away in his chubby little fist and I don't know they are there. August tries to engage me in conversations about balls, but all he can contribute is single word "Ball." He has even chuckled and grinned as he drifted off to sleep in my arms and uttered "Ball."

Daddy push-ups

August is a pretty coordinated little guy; he can run. He and sister often run a play chase in circles around the house. They also still love to play jumping and falling on the couch. August figured out how to ride sister's scooter, so we got him one with a shorter handle bar.

Getting his groove on

We went to the beach at the end of May. I was told Gus had already had Hand Foot Mouth disease at his 1 year appointment, but he got a different strain with a very pronounced texbook rash while we were on our family vacation. So for the second year in a town, he spent most of the beach vacation feeling lousy.

Wednesday, March 12, 2014

The title to this blog is a total shocker- 4 years old! She's a solid pre-schooler now. Isla has been very excited about her upcoming birthday and birthday party.

Swinging after Yoga class

Things Isla has said recently that made me laugh:
When I asked her if she wanted a ponytail today, she said "No, a bum."
Isla started parroting me and I have realized I say "actually" a lot. Jason has been trying to get her to say "indubitably." He said it and at a time Isla was irritated and she replied "No-doobily!" When I asked if she wiped her bottom after going potty, "Unfortunately, I did not wipe my bottom."

Cast going on

What's she into these days: Isla loves her arts/ crafts. She can play around with a pad of paper or sticker page for hours. She is still reinacting Valentines Day and gives out little notes to everyone all the time. There has also been a doll revival in this house, and she spends a lot of time taking care of her little dollies. She continues to take swim lessons, dance/ gymnastics, and Yoga classes.

This is how to slide with a cast

Isla has a "caretaker" quality about her. She is kind and sweet towards younger, or even just the shier kids she is around. She has been good about our "no grabbing" policy, and does not take things out of her brother's hands.

Last day being 3

We are so happy with Isla's Austin preschool. She loves her school, and is happy to go there every day. She even started telling me for the past few months, "I love my school." Music to my ears.

Cast still on

Isla broke her arm about a month before her 4th birthday. She was holding her dolls in her right arm, and in a rush to get outside, Jason tripped her, and she fell onto her left arm, breaking her distal radius. She mostly seemed entertained by the whole ordeal. I negotiated her cast coming off just before her B-day.

Cast coming off

For Isla's 4th birthday, we had a party at our house. Grandma and Grandpa Dino and Dolores visited. Our special activity was the band "The Que Pastas" came and gave a concert on our deck. We miss the 3 year-old who was unhindered by social norms and into her skunks and sharks. Now Isla is into the princesses. I steared her towards Tinkerbell for the birthday party decor. She's all girl and loves to wear pretty dresses and accessorizing.